Confession Interruptus
by girl undone
Summary: Commander Shepard tries to tell Garrus Vakarian why he might be the one who wants something closer to home, but, in his own words, he was never a very good turian. Rated M for language and not-very-graphic xeno-sexual situations. One-shot.


A/N: This is the first time I've ever written a romance of any sort. I apologise in advance for all of it. As always, Bioware owns all. For reference, latkes are potato pancakes (and should always be super crispy in this author's opinion!) and a Bat Mitzvah is a Jewish girl's coming-of-age ceremony. Again, all mistakes are my own.

* * *

Commander Shepard took a deep breath. She had faced a rogue Spectre, countless geth in various forms, krogan clones, asari mercs, and not one, but two thresher maws on foot. Surely she could speak to her gunnery officer in an even, steady voice and not be reduced to a quivering bundle of nerves. It was best not to think about it. _Just open the door, Rachel, before Gardner starts snickering or Goldstein ropes you into another soggy-or-crispy _latkes _debate. _

Crispy, always. She was confident in her opinion of how_ latkes _should be fried and she used that confidence to open the door to the main battery without thinking about it again.

Garrus stood with his back to the door, taloned fingers moving quickly over the console. He said over his shoulder, "Shepard. Need me for something?

"Have you got a minute?" Her hands were locked behind her back as she stared at the Garrus' back. _Do not look down, Rachel, do not look down._

_What a fine piece of-_

"Can it wait for a bit? I'm in the middle of some calibrations."

Her eyes snapped up to his face and she sincerely hoped she couldn't read turian facial expressions nearly as well as she thought she could because his flaring mandibles gave her the very distinct impression he caught her staring at his ass. Not for the first time in her life, she thanked G-d she didn't blush. She didn't know why she possessed this one very useful gift, being so pale and having red-gold hair, but it was times like this that she was most thankful for it.

Then again, he was the one who kept making horrible metaphors. They obviously couldn't be in the same room together without doing or saying something inappropriate unless it involved moving targets, assault and sniper rifles. She unlocked her hands and let them fall to her sides. "Oh, right, of course. It's just that I- Well- It's important."

Garrus had indeed amused and really would have been more than happy to abandon his calibrations in other pursuits, but the Thanix cannon needed to be optimised if they wanted any chance of another Reaper attack on the ship, let alone if they make it through the other side of the Omega-4 Relay. Still, Shepard hardly ever stumbled over her words and the one time he thought he saw fear on her face, he had a rocket lodged in his face. _She_ was the one who made him nervous, not the other way around. "Oh, well, I guess-"

He had tilted his head in concern, drawing his mandibles in. That, combined with his bright blue eyes meeting hers melted her resolve. Now she was stammering as much as he was. "Oh, no, no, it's fine, really, I just wanted- needed- er," She rubbed the back of her neck, a tell of soreness and awkwardness. _You can do this, Rachel. You've done far harder things in your life. _"Just, uh, come up to my cabin when you have a minute."

Turians didn't have eyebrows, but that had other ways of looking surprised. "I thought we didn't want to disrupt the crew."

Suddenly the Commander Shepard the public knew appeared before him. No longer nervous or awkward, she crossed the space between them, leaving him step back into the console and jabbed one of her uniquely human fingers into his chestplate _Aggressive. Maybe she had watched those embarrassing vids Mordin had sent him_. _Oh damn, did he just make that sound aloud? _"That was your idea. I don't give a damn what they think." She relaxed her hand and let her palm rest against him. He knew it was impossible, but Garrus could swear he could feel her hand through his scorched armour. She quirked that little smile of hers. "Besides, I said talk. But if you keep making that sound..." Her other hand was sliding up to his cybernetic-knit mandible.

_Oh, damn, it was aloud. All of it._

"I, uh," Garrus shifted uncomfortably, raising a hand to cover her own. Shepard's face was tilted up him, her wide, alien-hued greenish-grey eyes veiled with those funny, but somehow alluring black fringes. What were they called? He couldn't remember. Those fleshy pink lips of hers were parted, distracting his thoughts. No, that wasn't right. Not one single bit of her was distracting him; it was her whole being. Her mere presence turned his brain to tupi berry mush. He clasped his hand down on her deadly little white hand before he lowered them to her hip. "I think you've left me in a _great_ place for optimising firing algorithms, Shepard. And, uh, if you don't leave in about two seconds like a commander who just had a nice, friendly chat with her gunnery officer, we're going to have to mine the Hades Gamma cluster for a week to rebuild the main battery."

She really couldn't help but grin up at him. She stepped back, dropping his hand to hold hers up to in defeat. "All right, all right. You just had to throw mining in there. Complete mood killer. So, you'll come up later?" She was still smiling, but it no longer reached her eyes. She was definitely anxious about something.

"Of course. I'll be there in a few hours."

She nodded and reached for the door console. As the doors hissed opened, she turning on her heel and resumed her stiff, shoulders back, chin-lifted posture and said in a brusque tone, "I'll let you get back to work." The doors shut quickly behind her.

He missed her hands already, but felt a little relieved. That damned forsaken gun really needed to be worked on and he could barely breathe when she was in the room. He actually felt both proud of himself for staying in control and a bit ashamed he felt pride in it. Still, despite the reassuring grin she had worn, Shepard had seemed so anxious to talk. At first, his own anxiety flared. She must be trying to break it off. But why would she then make such a proposition? He shook his head, staring at the console without seeing. He wasn't going to think that. She gave absolutely no signs of wanting to stop anything with him. She just wanted to talk. He heard of this phenomenon with human women. He heard about it from her, actually. Deep in the middle of the cyclical night on the original Normandy, he was headed toward the mess when he heard the Commander's voice coupled with another female- one through an envirosuit. He hadn't meant to eaves drop, exactly, but he never heard the Commander laugh so freely before. Tali was having trouble sleeping on the ship she deemed 'too quiet' and apparently the Commander simply couldn't sleep at all, despite pills from Dr. Chakwas and her own brand of medicine- a quick shag- which was she spilling to Tali. She had complained, rather bitterly to young quarian who had become a fast friend to her, about Alenko's endless need to share his emotions and make grand gestures when all she wanted was to shag and sleep, in that order. How she was the 'man' in the relationship. He remembered Tali giggling and exclaiming and Shepard teasing the poor girl to hiccuping laughter that she was really a better match for the LT. He also remembered how he burnt with jealously over Alenko's relationship with the Commander, guilt that he felt such a way toward his commanding offer and crewmate and self-loathing that he was now undeniably one of those deviant turians who lusted after humans. Or, well, one human in particular.

Kaidan Alenko. There was another mood killer. At least his armour didn't feel so tight now.

* * *

Several hours later, Garrus Vakarian stood in front of the Commander's quarters in his civilian gear. Her door was lit green and he shrugged, assuming EDI had alerted Shepard of his presence and unlocked the door. The door hissed opened and he stepped through.

She wasn't there, but there was a sudden crash and stream of curses from the tiny bathroom he spied by Shepard's personal terminal. With a quick, curious glance at all the model ships she had collected through the Terminus Systems, the little space hamster Joker bought her as a gag that was fondly called Chaucer as an homage to gift-giver, he hurried to the door to find Commander Shepard dripping wet and bent over to pick up whatever fell.

"OH! I didn't mean- I thought EDI- I'll just.."

She looked up, startled. "Garrus?" Who knew the mighty Commander Shepard could squeak like her space hamster? He had his back to her as she grabbed the nearest thing to her- an ancient grey tee shirt that Joker had donated to her Cerberus-logo-free clothing crusade, and scrambled into a pair of stretchy black shorts she slept in. "I asked EDI to shut down. I didn't hear you. I dropped something." She was standing up now, rubbing her hair with a towel. "You can turn around. I swear, nothing to see here." Her arms were crossed self-consciously across her chest. _Oh, damn, these are practically underwear. Thank G-d I don't blush._

Garrus might have been blue if turians could, though. He turned, but despite the fact she was indeed clothed, he kept seeing what he walked in on. _Her armour hides so _much. He shook his head, trying to clear the mental image. "I.. uh.. I'll just.. can come back later."

She reached out to grab his arm. "Garrus, it's not like I don't check your out five times a day." Her mouth was quirked in her genuine smile.

He found himself grinning back at her, mandibles flaring wide. "Well, I do dress so stylishly."

* * *

He wasn't entirely sure how they ended up like this. From banter and quips to Shepard, wrapped tightly in his arms, her wet head pressed against his chest, her arms flung around his cowl. He could feel the water seeping through his tunic from her damp, grey tee shirt that slipped over her smooth shoulder, glistening blue from the dim light of the fish tank. Her hair, that strange human oddity, had first looked like silk, but now resembled soggy coils. He ran a talon through it, amazed to see it spring back into place.

She said she wanted to talk, but she still hadn't spoken. He almost wondered if she was falling asleep against him. Her breathing was so relaxed, her heart beat so calm. So rarely he saw her peaceful. Not that he minded. She could use the sleep. But it was rather awkward having your commanding officer, clad only in a worn tee shirt and, it appeared, some kind of extremely short pants that disappeared under the shirt, fall into a doze on you.

"How does it do that?"

She didn't even look up at him in curiosity. Just nestled closer against him. "It's curly. I dropped the iron when you came in. That was the cursing."

Now he was confused. "You put iron in your hair to make it straight?" Before he could wonder about that, she laughed against chest. He felt a spark spread through his body and purred in response, without meaning to._ Dammit._ But she just smiled against him. "I love the way that feels. I love how warm you are. And, no, I do not put the actual mineral of iron in my hair. I straighten it. It's just easier to go out in the field that way. Curls have a habit of falling in your face all the time, slipping out of pins and restraints. It's easier to manage when it's straight. I'm surprised Miranda didn't alter my genes to make it straight."

He huffed at the suggestion. "I like it this way." He tugged at it again to watch it spring back.

She laughed again. "You like playing with it. I don't care what Cerberus and humanity-first groups say. You're all alike."

"Us? Us who?"

"Men."

Garrus laughed at the condemnation in her voice. "Oh, I beg to differ. If you recall that time in Chora's Den, only one of your squad mates was not distract-" _Damn. You had to bring that up, Vakarian_.

She looked up at his bright blue eyes and slid her hand up to his injured mandible. It fluttered under her touch. "It's all right. That's what I wanted to talk about."

"Oh. Right." He broke off her gaze, dropping his arms from her damp form, sagging in defeat. He was right. She wanted something closer to 'home'.

"No. Listen to me." She gently pulled his face back to meet her eyes with one hand and used to other to encourage his arm back around her waist. "Please." She was polite, but she never begged. He didn't fight his urge to hold her tightly again, to protect her. But she was suddenly tense in his arms. "I need to tell you some things. About me. You keep saying asking me 'why me' and I need to give you a fair out. You might feel differently after all this."

"Shepard, I don't want-"

"No, _please_. Listen to me. I've never discussed any of this before. Why should Miranda and The Illusive Man know and not you? My- Garrus, I don't want lose you. Even if you don't want to... pursue this after what I tell you, you're still my best friend."

He knew humans were vulnerable. Turians and krogans often wondered how they put up such a fight on the battlefield. But he wasn't used to seeing this human- his commander- look so small and desperate. He tightened his arms around her, as though to tell her didn't care. Then to use his tongue, too. "Shepard, you couldn't do or say anything to lose me."

He looked so open, so honest, so eager. She wished, for the briefest moment, that she didn't love him. She didn't want that look to turn to revulsion and anger. But she had to put her feelings aside. This wasn't fair. "I'm not the great paragon that you think I am, Garrus."

He opened his mouth, then was silent. She had dropped her eyes from his clear blue gaze. Her tell of embarrassment. Her lips were curled down. _Disgust_, he thought. _At herself?_ He didn't wonder aloud. She would talk now. It would just take time.

They stood there for a few moments, still locked in their embrace. Her hands were pressed against his shoulders now, but she wasn't pushing him away. Her fingers curled slightly, like she was testing something. Not him, perhaps a thought.

"You know, on Earth, I wasn't exactly a model citizen, after... After- My parents died when I was thirteen." She looked up at him before he could ask. "Aircar bombing. During my Bat Mitzvah." His translated must have glitched. He had no idea what she said, but he didn't interrupt. "A lot of anti-religion groups rose after the Prothean ruins were found on Mars." She paused for a long moment, then took a breath, steering herself on. "I had no other family. I was lost. I had gone to private schools, that was gone. My friends, my parents' friends, all abandoned me. I had no one. The child services system on Earth... especially in metropolises like New York..." she grimaced. "I was on the street without an ounce of street sense."

What could he say? He was sorry? He was, deeply. He wanted to take the pain from her. She wouldn't like it, though. "You could have fooled me," he quipped halfheartedly.

"Oh, I learned. I had no skills." He looked down at her in disbelief. He had seen her drop an unsuspecting merc at 300 clicks. If that wasn't skill alone, what about Akuze? Saren, Sovereign, and the Citadel? But she seemed amused at his expression. "I wanted to be an anthropologist." She laughed, as though incredulous of her forgotten daydreams. "I wanted study the history of all the new species we were encountering. I didn't know how to steal food or keep off a bunch- an attacker." He tensed, but once again didn't interrupt. Still, the thought that someone had hurt her-

"I got recruited to the 10th Street Reds because I had a pretty face." She laughed bitterly. "Not to sell red sand or fight in a turf war... They wanted me to dance in places that make Afterlife and your favourite, Chora's Den, look like, what was it? Classy antique shops. They wanted-"

He finally stopped her, moving his hands to her arms, hoping he wasn't gripping her too roughly. "Shepard-"

"Rachel. Call me Rachel already."

"Rachel," his deep voice was softer now, though still so strong. She marveled as she felt it reverberate through her. Her name sounded so beautiful on his rigid lips. "You don't need to tell me this. You were a child. A child who was hurt. Do you think I could blame you for that?"

Her mouth quirked up, but it was a sad smile. "I've never told anyone. I don't know, honestly. But- that's not what happened, exactly." She paused again and his hands fell from her arms, back around her waist. She seemed to prefer relating all this to him when he held her like this. He certainly didn't mind obliging. "I mean, it did, at first, but then they realised I could be more useful elsewhere." He tensed. What had they done with her? His mind began to fill with rage on her behalf, but she kept talking now, as though to stifle it.

"Little did I know, I did have a skill." She paused. "Before training, that is. It was... a sense of sorts. To pick out easy marks. Charm things out of people. Get cops off our back, some money out of men, information out of others. Eventually I became, well," She paused, embarrassed. "Their honeytrap."

Garrus was utterly confused. He was hesitant to interrupt her, but he couldn't follow anymore without asking. "Honeytrap? You used a trap... with honey? Human men like this?"

She was laughing. Tinged with that bitterness, but laughing. "No, no. Oh, you almost had a horrible metaphor there, but no. It's a phrase. An old one, actually. _I _was the trap. Lured them in and left them to... to some pretty horrible fates." She pressed her head against his chest and he could feel her tensing again. "I didn't know which was worse. Either way, they used me, but I didn't know how else to survive. I tried to run away, but.. you remember that old scar, from... before?"

"I always thought that was from Akuze."

She inhaled sharply, shuddered again in memory. "No, I had a lot of acid burns, but that scar, that was from trying to run away. They didn't want to ruin my 'pretty face' of course," her words dripped with acid, "but I suppose it was better that they decided to let me keep my eye and just frame it with a scar. Gave me character, they said."

"Shep- Rachel-"

She shook her head and plowed on, determined to finish. "After that, I got cockier. I don't know why. Maybe I wanted them to slice my throat open. I didn't want to live like that any more. I stopped picking such easy marks. Then, one day, we were in a bar. Not like the ones I had... worked in, but not very classy either. Very blue collar. Working class," she amended for the sake of his understanding. "There was a man in Alliance dress blues. I had a thought, like lightning through me. I could enlist and the Reds could never touch me again. I never thought of what an idiotic idea it was. I had no skills, no training. I was soft and weak. But I thought, maybe I could go in for intelligence. I had schooling, as I said. I even know a few words in turian." She smiled up at him briefly. "Just basic things. Hello, good bye, where is the toilet? Don't get excited."

His mandibles flared in a weak smile for her. She pressed her head against his chest again. "So I convinced the two others I was with that he was an good target. I wanted to talk to him." He could feel her lips curling into a smirk. "He saw right through me, but played along for the audience. He kept slipping in comments that the Alliance could use someone like me. I told him he'd been watching too many old vids from the 20th century. There weren't seductive spies charming secrets out of enemy government workers anymore. But he wouldn't leave it. Slipped me him contact when he let me lift his credit chit and some access codes to more credits. The guys I were with bought the whole damned thing. They weren't expecting to make much of a score to begin with. They decided to line up drinks on Staff Lieutenant Harrington's bill. They never noticed I wasn't drinking to keep up with them. They were still wasted the next morning and, by then, I had signed, sealed, and delivered myself to the Alliance."

He couldn't resist tugging on one of her now-dry curls again. She laughed, tightening her arms around his cowl. "You such a strange obsession with my hair. It's not going to look the way it usually does unless I straighten it."

She could feel his reverberating laughter in her ribs. "My strange obsession? What about you and my voice?"

"It's a sexy voice! It goes with your sexy ass."

He made a noise, like purring, grabbing her own behind. She tried not to let out a squeal from his talons. "Yours isn't so bad, either."

She looked up with half-veiled eyes; her voice was low. But she held herself tense. "So you don't mind I was basically the same kind of scum you'd arrest as a C-Sec officer?"

He looked down at her, pulling her even closer if nothing else. "You were never scum. You were a kid trying to survive. Like those poor duct rats on the Citadel. You think I'd ever have locked one of them away for stealing food or credits to live?" She broke off his gaze, looking away. "It makes so much sense now. Why you would spend your life-" She winced and tried to pull away, but he held her firmly. " Your time running around to save everyone's soul on this ship. Why you helped Tali when I first met you. I'm not like-" She stiffened as though she heard what name he stopped himself from saying. He quickly amended, "I don't care about regs or rules. I care about getting the job done. That's what you do. And you do your damnedest to help everyone along the way. _Everyone_."

"Garrus, I used him. I wanted- Oh G-d, it sounds so pathetic and weak- I wanted to sleep. I've had nightmares since Earth, Akuze... Right, I'm some big goddamn hero! I woke up screaming every night for years. Then the Prothean beacons, the cipher, the goddamn husks that wouldn't die, Saren dogging us," The words were pouring out of her. "I didn't want to talk and share my feelings with him. I didn't want him to care. I didn't _want _him. Not really. I should have pushed him away. I wanted to sleep. G-d! I just wanted to sleep! Dr. Chakwas fed me pills. injected me, and then all but gave up when I still looked like sand-blasted junkie. And I thought, well, I thought if-" She was fighting to make herself say it, forcing the words out. "Maybe if I just had him, at least I'll fall asleep afterward! G-d, and he went around thinking I saved him on Virmire because I loved him! Like I had a choice and made some sort of show of pure, devoted love! I wish to G-d I could have saved them both. I wish to G-d I had been strong enough to-"

"You did everything you could."

That bitter laugh again. She twisted her body away, dropping her arms to her sides, but he refused to let her go. "Right, and screwed him, too. I really did everything I could."

He growled in protest. "Rachel, he must have known."

But she spit out over him, "And then he has the goddamn balls to say he _loved_ me! _Me!_ As though he ever knew anything about me!" She looked outraged, as she had on Horizon.

Garrus still remembered how she looked like she wanted to pistol whip the back of Alenko's retreating head, but always assumed it was because he all but called her a traitor and then had the nerve to turn his back on her. Not because she felt guilty for Kaidan's misguided feelings toward her.

They were both silent for a moment. Her breathing had grown ragged with rancor at herself. She tried to twist away from him again when he went quiet in thought.

"No." He had a way of making his voice low, but clear as bell. He moved his hands up to her hips and held her. She jerked her head to the side, refusing to look at him. "I don't want you to think I'm doing the same with you. I..."

He bent his head to nudge her face up, refusing to loose his grip. "I knew."

She stilled, then slowly looked up at him. "But-"

"I, uh, heard you and Tali one night in the mess. On the old Normandy" It was his turn to speak quickly. "I didn't mean to listen in. You were laughing. I never heard you laugh before. Shep- Rachel," now he rushed, "I knew before that. No, not knew, maybe, but wanted to believe it. Whenever you came by the Mako, I wanted to say something. Spirits, I wanted to _do_ something. When I saw you coming over the bridge on Omega," Her eyes were wide now, and she unconsciously caressed his scarred mandible from that day, "You threw your arms open and-"

She interrupted, her hands falling to his waist but not quite touching the narrow expanse. "I wanted to hug you. Great N7 training, huh? Surrounded by mercs and mechs, never mind a gunship, and I pause for a hug."

She never thought cobalt eyes could smolder like that. "I _didn't_ hug you."

Her voice was coy again, as it had been when she bantered with him all the way back on the old Normandy, draped against the Mako as he worked on it, her wide human hips cocked out. These days when she dropped down in a graceful sprawl on a crate in new ship's main battery. Now, after all these years, he knew what that female human body language meant. "I always wondered why you didn't. I _was_ about to save your life." Her hands stopped hovering and rested lightly, oh-so-lightly before then ran a teasing length around his waist.

His mandibles flared and his hands slid up the curves of her hips to rise of her breasts and then down to her sculpted rear. She inhaled sharply. They were pressed so closely together an atom couldn't slip by. "You had those two with you. I didn't want to make a scene."

Her voice was unlike anything he heard from her before; husky and hungry. "I think you want to make one now." She gasped as she saw a flash of movement and felt him nip her bared shoulder, her collarbone, his raspy tongue on her thin flesh. It was a struggle to continue to string sentences together. "But before we do, I need to know you're okay with all of this. What happened on Earth, with Kai-" She suddenly couldn't speak. How did he _do_ that?

She trembled, not knowing if it was his voice echoing through her body, or the joy of what he said and did. "I want this because I want _you_. I've loved you since the day you tried to make yourself a hood ornament on my Mako."

She gasped, though not entirely out of outrage at his words. "_Your_ Mako! I never-!"

"We can argue about it over there. Then later there. And that looks like a good spot, too."

She laughed breathlessly, grabbing at his tunic to slip her hands underneath, "It's not as classy as an antique shop."

Suddenly his tunic and her once-decrepit-now-shredded grey tee were on the floor. Her fleshy, wet lips were dropping kisses on his warm, plated chest; her long fingers were tracing designs on the softer hide on his waist. One hand slid its upward until it was stroking deft fingers under his fringe. It was his turn to be breathless, "No, but with you there, any place is beautiful."

For the first time in her life, Shepard wished she could blush.

The remainder of their wardrobe hastily followed their predecessors to the floor and the room fell silent of any actual words in either English or turian.


End file.
